Once Upon A Time & A Half In Vegas

Once upon and time and a half, in this faraway land called Vegas, we stumble across the land of the Teamster and other gangs of professionals. These upright and decent crews have forgotten more than I know about the event world, zooming around on electric chariots, filled with the tools of their trade, they reinforce my absolute love for this job. Plumbers, electricians, internet, carpet fitters; they all arrive and depart on their assigned buggy, administering their profession to the trade show booth, in exchange for an enthusiastic signature approving the time and work they have done.

We can claim over 38 trucks out of the 400 that deliver a mountain of heavy equipment over the course of two days to the convention centre. Every truck is weighed, staged and checked before it’s passed onto the forklifts for unloading. This logistics jigsaw is overseen from the busiest 6ft table in the building. From the early hours, to deep into the night, the logistics team sit behind orders in triplicate, backed up with post it notes, all strategically placed within the day’s map of empty Starbuck coffee cups.

HP’s temporary Vegas home, booth C5432, lives in this land of the trade show folk, who steer the forklift wheels that makes the magic happen. The 5-ton iron horses that unload, move, lift with absolute precision carrying drivers with names like “Boots” and “Goggles”, are the apparent ring masters of the show build.

The dexterity, coordination and choreography of the forklift team lives up to any Vegas stage show. The masters at the wheel, never leave their seat, never! They can eat, drink, unload trucks and enjoy a multi-forklift lunch time chin wag, without a single boot stepping down from the chariot. They don’t waste time directing the less experienced truck drivers into the most optimum loading position. The driver gets one go, then they suffer the indignity of the teamsters simply picking up the back of the empty trailer and moving it with their forklift – job done, no fuss and never to be mentioned again!

Deep in the bowels of the convention centre, is the Gringots Bank of the trade show. This is the place where you can order anything you want, or you have forgotten to pre-order. A most dangerous place for the untrained, as it is here that you could easily bankrupt Elon Musk by simply ordering one too many tablecloths. The fabulous and enthusiastic desk team take your order day or night, then the cascade of requests filter down to the shop floor and before you know it, a chariot of supplies arrives on your booth and your corporate wallet get significantly lighter.

As trade show management, we are the conductors of a huge orchestra of talent, we know a little about everything, our job to keep the incredible team who know a lot about something, all playing the same tune. This fabulous orchestra of talent are the real stars of the show, often unseen or recognised, they play their part precisely and in most cases to perfection. They are the reason wheels go round and walls get built, they fix the unfixable and ever so quietly tweaking a splodge socket or two so that, we, the very average person can rest easy knowing (or thinking) that the world is still round and the sun will still come up in the morning without the need for any human sacrifice.

A successful show to me is one where I learn something new and the orchestra plays a symphony that like no other, seemingly not missing a single note and lifting the roof off the venue. I was proud to be one of the conductors at Print United and even prouder of the load and proud tune we played together.